


Moves We Take

by ObsidianRomance



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Bottom Sam, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mpreg, Wincest - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-24
Updated: 2013-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-05 22:00:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1099079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ObsidianRomance/pseuds/ObsidianRomance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After finding a place for himself hunting with Dean again and sharing the same bed, Sam finds himself pregnant.  Lying is an old protective instinct Sam falls back on and he knows Dean isn't going to be happy about anything when he finds out.<br/>Dean finds out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Moves We Take

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dimeliora](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dimeliora/gifts).



> Written for the [mpreg_xmas_xchg ](http://mpreg-xmas-xchg.livejournal.com/)for [Dimeliora](http://dimeliora.livejournal.com/)'s prompt.  I hope you like it sweetie!  
> Beta: [2people2](http://2people2..livejournal.com/) *hugs*  
> Banner: [Bt_Kady](http://bt-kady.livejournal.com/) (love it as always!)

The world, for Sam, is nothing but confusing.

He swore he wanted the type of life where he didn’t have to think about things that go bump in the night.  There are times when he can’t remember a time he actually believed he would be a hunter like his brother and father when he grew up.  Sure, there were the times when he was a little slip of a thing and all he wanted to do was be like his big brother.  There were those times, but then he got tired of moving around and cutting ties with people who weren’t hunters.  For the most part, Sam always wanted to make something out of himself that was more than the mysterious vagabond hunters were always seen as by people outside their lifestyle.

Then something changed.

It didn’t happen quickly, but it didn’t happen slowly.

It really didn’t happen at all.

Instead, time wore away at Sam and exposed something even he didn’t know was there.

When Dean came and yanked him out of the life he had made for himself in Stanford, Sam didn’t want any part of it.

Then he got a taste and he got burned and just like that he was back in.  He was pulled down deep into Dean’s world and there were things that were digging into him and making him stay there.

There were things he relearned about himself.

He rediscovered that he was good at hunting.  He was rusty with some of the physical elements and his reflexes were slow from disuse, but his brain was sharp and he dove into solving cases like it was second nature.

Sam also learned that, once his shot at a normal life started dwindling into the distance, he felt like he belonged in the passenger seat next to his brother, remembering why it was that he idolized him and looked up to him.

It was weird at first.  He wouldn’t let himself admit traveling with Dean wasn’t so bad because he didn’t want to acknowledge that the years spend fighting the hunting lifestyle were all fruitless.  He fought it like the plague and used a heavy dose of nonchalance to get him through the first few weeks.

Then they kept solving cases and saving lives and Sam couldn’t stop the genuine smile from spreading across his face.  It was there and Dean knew it was there so while they kept pretending Sam was miserable and that he was out of this whole hunting deal once Yellow Eyes was dead, they both knew the truth.

Sam fought against it, but then he started thinking he belonged in this life but it was never an easy fit.  He always had to jam himself into it, and shave off some genuine parts of himself that couldn’t exist in the life he was living on the road with Dean.

When John died, things spiraled wildly out of control and landed in some really unexpected places.

For the most part, Sam thought it had been him and Dean against the world.  As much as he fought it, he had to admit there was something else.  John was their spine and they’d grown up with that in the background and at their core.

Without him, they both floundered for a while, Dean more than Sam.  It was an odd rearranging of their lives but with their father gone, Sam realized Dean had no one else but him.  The same was true for Sam.  They were all they truly had in the world and that changed things.

Lines were blurred and crossed all together.

Their codependence and their merged way of thinking landed Sam in a place he fit more perfectly than his rational Stanford brain would have predicted.

As much as he was fitting into the hunting lifestyle with Dean, he fit even better under the sheets with his brother.  He fit best, felt like he most belonged, under the weight of Dean’s body.  It was where he found himself again, every time Dean pinned him there.  There were thousands of positions to have sex in but he liked being face to face with Dean more than any others, because Dean was able to blanket himself over Sam and make him feel settled. 

For as much as Sam had outgrown Dean years ago, Dean was able to still be his big brother. That was the part Sam didn’t remember happening. There was no decision to want Dean sexually; that development in their lives just appeared.  There was no cognitive decision between the two of them to sleep together.  It just happened and slid into place like their lives did.  There was drinking and talking but then it just happened and hadn’t stopped happening since.

Sam’s favorite place to be was beside his brother, working as a team.  His second favorite place to be was trapped under Dean, writhing from pleasure while Dean worked inside of him and made Sam feel alive, worthy, and like they were part of one functioning entity.

Handfuls of things about Sam’s life were not at all what he expected so he should have expected more of the same.

He should have expected the shock in his gut when he sat in the bathroom and stared at three very positive pregnancy tests.

Sam should have predicted a lot of things.  He should have been ready for a lot of things.  For as much hell as he and Dean had gone through, Sam should have been ready for all the switchbacks in his life to happen without notice.

But he wasn’t.

He stared at three tests saying he was pregnant, and he knew he had Dean to thank for that.

Because he had no idea how to react to that, Sam didn’t react at all.  Even though his hands shook while he gathered up the tests and took them outside to bury at the depths of the motel’s dumpster, Sam’s brain didn’t react.  Even though his breathing grew erratic and his stomach clenched with fear and hopelessness, he made his feet move and he forced himself to forget what just happened.

He built up a routine, one that lasted weeks.

It was easy to act like nothing was out of the ordinary at first because nothing was.  Sam looked like Sam and felt like Sam.  The normality of it all made the part in Sam’s brain that knew about the pregnancy take a long hike and the part of Sam’s personality that helped Dean believe that everything was as it should be glared through.  He thought maybe he made a mistake but it was just a fruitless dream.  Another secretive pregnancy test session on the side of the road clarified everything.  He was definitely pregnant and definitely not telling Dean.

It got harder after two months.

After two months Sam had to figure out how to throw up on the sly.  It was easy at first, when he was only throwing up once a day.  He learned to play it off as too much shitty food or too much beer despite only pretending to drink it.  When he ended up throwing up as soon as consciousness hit him and halfway through the day, things got harder.  Basically, he started setting his alarm for a good while earlier than Dean’s.  It allowed him time to retch into the toilet while the showerhead ran loud enough to drown out any noises. 

He started disappearing more.

It wasn’t as hard as he thought it would be.  Sam had always taken naturally to doing research so it didn’t seem odd to Dean when Sam started volunteering to do more of the leg work for their hunts.  There were hours of time Sam spent researching but what Dean didn’t know was that he was using the time to feel miserable and curl up somewhere private and allow himself to actual feel that way.  Hiding things from Dean was exhausting but so was pregnancy, apparently, and Sam felt himself losing the upper hand. 

After three months, Sam started finding a rhythm.  There were times when he was lucky he’d always been in tune with tiny nuances and shifts in the world and his body.  For as non-reactive as he’d been, he was on top of hiding the pregnancy.  Hiding it allowed him to keep not reacting and pretending it wasn’t happening.

He also hid it for a lot of other reasons.  One being the fact that he and Dean found out about the trace amounts of demon blood running through Sam’s system.  On some level, Sam swore Dean thought parts of Sam were bad, bad, _bad_ and logic deemed that those parts would also be in the genetic makeup of their kid.

The one he was busy convincing himself didn’t exist.

He couldn’t tell Dean, despite the fact that telling Dean would have made things easier.  It would help him deal with the burden that he was hiding and figure out where all the throwing up and heavy feelings were going.  There were a thousand other things Dean had to worry about.  There were hundreds of other things more important than a fetus, things that could actually alter the natural flow of the human world.  Sam wouldn’t let himself be selfish enough to come between their chances at actually catching Yellow Eyes.

At the core, Sam knew it was fear that fueled most of his determination to ignore the fact that he was pregnant.  He was afraid that Dean would reject the thing growing in Sam’s middle, bundling Sam into that rejection package as well.  He was afraid it would be _all_ wrong and mess up _all_ their plans, not that they had any but Sam was pretty sure they didn’t involve a baby.

So instead of dealing with rejection, instead of dealing with being pregnant, Sam bought bigger shirts.  He invested in slouchy sweatshirts and hoodies.  He lived in them.  Even if he was sweating underneath the layers, Sam refused to take them off.  For the most part, that worked.

There were times, however, when Dean got handsy, when he tried to sneak his hands under Sam’s shirts or tugged him close.  Evasive maneuvers came as regularly to Sam as salt-and-burns did.  He was able to flip around and let Dean get his hands on him while avoiding his belly.  It had grown past the size where he could get away with blaming it on beer.  Sex in the dark was cutting it for now but Sam knew he was a ticking time bomb and no amount of darkness or hoodies would be able to keep Dean off the scent of his pregnancy in a few weeks.

Thankfully, most of Dean’s brain was too stuck on all things supernatural to see the sloppy clues Sam let slip of a very natural pregnancy. Part of Sam reacted oddly to that.  Most of his brain was working overtime to avoiding thinking about the pregnancy, leaving him with nothing to think logically with.  He found himself annoyed that Dean wasn’t paying enough attention to him to notice things were wildly out of the ordinary for Sam.

Then he felt the kid shift inside him and he stopped caring.  It was weird and very real, making quick work of obliterating Sam’s original plan of ignoring the pregnancy.

Throwing up all the time, being exhausted half of his waking hours, his belly rounding out – none of these things banged a dent into Sam’s resolve to deny he was pregnant.  The minute he felt the kid move, however, and Sam knew he was doomed.

Before any signs of life, Sam was able to pretend this was just another snag in his life that would work its way out, the way lots of things had.  After Sam was presented with the fact that something alive, with a heart beating because of Sam and Dean’s DNA, Sam cried.  He completely broke down and cried in the middle of a gas station bathroom, fingers gripping a chipped porcelain sink and eyes staring at his sallow reflection.

After that, Dean noticed something was off.  Sam tried to keep up the façade that everything was as it should be, but it got harder.  The baby moved more in an attempt to prove to Sam that it did exist and was worth taking note of, and the more it moved, the more Sam withdrew.  His sweatshirts got bigger and his touches got colder.

If Dean questioned him as to what was going on, it was always the same response: “I’m just tired of hunting.”

It was a lie, but Sam watched it hurt Dean all the same.  The words were a double edged blade.  While they caused a weird look of longing to wash over Dean’s face, they also scared Dean into silence.  Sam knew Dean wouldn’t push the issue for fear that Sam would take things further and actually pull out of their relationship all together.

What Dean didn’t know because Sam wouldn’t tell him, was that every part of Sam’s brain was now on board with acknowledging his pregnancy but he wanted Dean to know about it too.

Stupidity made the words dry up on Sam’s tongue every time he tried to explain.

Senselessness made Sam think that by trying to prove to Dean that he could be the same old Sam while pregnant, he would reassure his brother enough that he’d accept a baby into their roller coaster of a life.  It’s why he never stopped going along for hunts with Dean, even the ones that put him in harm’s way.  He knew it was reckless, he also knew it wasn’t fair because he’d sidestepped danger to protect his unborn child many a times and sent it hurling in Dean’s direction.

In short, he was unreliable.  He wasn’t being fair to their partnership but fear warped his sense of fairness and selfishness made him to refuse choosing between his baby and his relationship with Dean.

Then things went wrong.  They were supposed to be on a routine werewolf kill but things got messy.  There was a kid involved and that blurred the line for Sam.  He got distracted and lost track of Dean.

It was enough of a disruption for the younger werewolf to take advantage of separating the two men.  He lunged at Sam and sealed his fate in determining whether or not Sam should kill him.  Sam slit his throat, but not before sending Sam crashing into a tree and twisting his arm back, spraining it but not breaking it.

It left Sam’s head spinning and his whole body throbbing.  The dead weight of the werewolf landed squarely on his belly, swollen with six months of pregnancy.  In the back of his head he’d thought about the fact that his middle was far too small to be that far along.  The past few months had been too stressful for his body to catch up with the pregnancy and the physical blow to his middle hurt him in several ways.

He got to his feet, vision swimming in darkness until he found a way to locate Dean.

Dean was pinned down under expert hands and an angry blur of a body intent on tearing Dean to shreds.  Sam was faced with watching it happen or stopping it.

He could do either.

His stomach dropped over the split second he put his baby’s life first and contemplated running.  Like every decision he’d made, however, Sam’s heart knew he’d save Dean, regardless of the cost.

In the end, Sam dove into the fight.  He yanked the werewolf off Dean, aware that the claws that had been ripping into Dean’s skin were now sinking into his own.  They fought, rolling and struggling.  He yowled when he felt the flesh and muscle of his arm rip unnaturally.  Pain blossomed in his world but Sam managed to get an arm free and a blade ripped at the flesh of the creature’s neck, dousing him in warm blood and the sickening nausea feeling brought on by an adrenaline drop.

Sam blacked out, vision fading in and out.

His consciousness flickered over a span of time he wasn’t certain of.  He rolled back to before the baby, back to when Dean landed flat on his back in the middle of his and Jess’ apartment.  Things sped forward, reminding him of everything, every little detail.

When he wakes up for real, he gasps.

Sam looks around, panicked, hands flying to his middle and trying to make sense of his surroundings.

“Easy, Sammy.”  Dean crowds Sam’s vision, hovering worriedly in front of him.

“Dean?  Wha?”  Sam swallows heavily and blinks.  He’s relieved to find that Dean, and only Dean, is with him.

“You got pretty banged up there, Sammy.”  Dean falls to the ground with a heavy thump next to Sam and digs through a small duffle bag.  “Let’s get you patched up, huh?”  He gives a smile big enough to hide how bad the damages to Sam’s back and arm are.  A hum of success leaves Dean’s mouth and he pulls out an intravenous needle and rubber stopped vial.

Sam tries to scurry backwards but the attempt at movement is too quick and he comes off looking like a frightened animal.  His eyes widen when he notices what vial Dean is plunging the needle into.  It’s morphine and a good deal of it.  Normally he’d welcome the relief it would bring but right now he wants to toss both needle and vial across the room.  “No!”

Dean looks at him with a confused expression, one eyebrow raising slightly higher than the other.  “Sam, it’s just something to make it easier for me to stitch you up.  I’m not as clean of a sewer as you are and I really don’t think you need more pain while I make a mess of your arm.”

“No…I…” Sam tries to skid backwards again, this time pulling himself several feet out of Dean’s reach.  “No…It’s not that bad.”  He foolishly looks at the open wound on his arm and knows there is no way on earth Dean will believe that.  “It’s fine…just do it like this…it’s…”  His whole body starts shaking, lungs included, and every breath he takes comes as unsteady and erratic.

Dean growls in frustration and tugs Sam closer, muttering under his breath.  “You always have to be more trouble than you should be, huh?  Gotta be the pig headed little brother.”  Dean shakes his head and snorts, moving the hand he is holding the needle with up to Sam’s arm.  He’s seconds away from sinking the needle in when Sam slaps him away with so much force that it surprise him.  “What he hell, Sam?”

“I…I…”  Eyes going wild, Sam brings his good arm to drape across his middle.  “I’m pregnant.  I…”  The words leave his mouth and they are the first time he’s ever said them out loud.  He’s startled by the way his tongue moves when he says them loud enough to hit Dean’s ears.  Staring at his brother, he thinks they probably both look equally shocked by the revelation.  There is relief but it isn’t enough, so he says them again.  “I’m pregnant.”

Dean doesn’t drop the morphine but he backs away and stares at his brother.  “What the fuck?”

“I…” There are no words that Sam can say to make the hurt on Dean’s face go away.  There is no way he can spin his months of lies and deceitfulness into something that makes sense.  It never made sense, it was just something he and Dean did.  They lie.  To each other.  Too often.  “I can’t….it could hurt the baby.  Don’t…”  He holds up a defensive palm against the needle in Dean’s hand.  “Please?”  The pleading comes out weak and fearful but works, apparently, when Dean drops the needle and his jaw at the same time.

Sam flinches when Dean’s hands are too rough and tugging up the bloody layers of shredded t-shirt and sweatshirt but he eventually exposes Sam’s middle, equally smeared with drying blood.  It’s round and making it obvious that Sam’s pregnant, which elicits a surprised gasp from Dean.  There is also a shallow gash running across it, blood turning sappy and clotting in a messy scab.  Both men draw a sharp breath at this and Sam turns his head quickly, not able to cope with thinking about losing the baby now that he’s finally acknowledged its existence.

“Sam, what the hell is that?”  Dean has a palm over Sam’s belly, molding to the curve of the swell.

Words dry up in Sam’s throat.  All he can get out is a cough and whine.  It seems almost expected when Sam feels himself losing his grip on his briefly won consciousness and his eyes roll back as he passes out into Dean’s arms.

The rest is darkness.

Even when he opens his eyes, there is darkness, the thick kind that is the result of heavy eyelids and natural loss of daylight.  The first word out of his mouth is automatic.  “Dean?”  When he swallows, his throat is dry and his tongue sticks to the inside, like he’s thrown up and doesn’t remember.  It makes his stomach turn over as he gags on the thought.

He tries to roll on his side, habit makes him turn towards the left, and reawakened pain hits him as his injured arm meets with bed sheets.  Immediately rolling onto his back, Sam reaches up to touch his wound with the fingers of his uninjured hand.  There are stiches there, raised and angry.  They’re not neat but they’re working to keep Sam from falling apart and spilling more blood.  Fingers traveling downward, they brush over his stomach and catch on the scab that formed there.  It’s clear that Dean must have cleaned the wound because instead of a mess of dried blood, Sam feels a thin ridge.

Almost like it knew that Sam needed to feel it, the baby shifts and kicks from within his womb.

It’s enough for Sam to breathe a sigh of relief.  He relaxes onto the bed, letting his weight sink into the mess of sheets.  The thoughts in his head are tousled and confused.  He knows he’s been reckless with hid health and that of the baby’s.  It’s irresponsible of him to be almost 24 weeks along and never once seek medical advice from anything more qualified than websites and personal blogs.  He knows, though, just like he knows how to read Dean, the baby is okay.  He feels it in his gut, a thought that is both reassuring and terrifying because he’s had premonitions before, very real ones.  They’re because of demon blood and if the feeling he is having is attributed to that, then he’s not exactly sure what type of person his baby is going to grow up to be.

Closing his eyes, Sam drowns everything out.  It’s quiet in the room and he forces his brain to shut down and join in.  He has a million things he should do and the basic need to find Dean is pulsing through him, but he’s scared of his search coming up empty.

Dean’s scratchy voice pierces the room.  “You’re an asshole.”  He’s sitting in a chair on the far side of the room, eyes locked on the emptiness of the wall in front of him like he’s staring a hole through it.  Everything about him seems prickly.

Sam’s heart skips a beat in surprise and he tries to push up from the bed.  He winces and groans in protests; his back feels like it’s raw and shredded.  Holding himself up is too much work and he falls down again, noticing the wetness at his back and smelling the tinge of blood in the air.  “I…”

“You’re torn the hell up, that’s what you are.  And you’re an asshole,” Dean repeats.  For the first time he looks at Sam, an expression daring Sam to defy him.  “Don’t get up.  I just barely stopped the bleeding.  If you make it worse, there aren’t any other options that don’t require a hospital.”  Dean gets up and stalks over to his brother, looking down at him with a type of judgment only capable of big brothers.  “What the hell is wrong with you?”

The only thing Sam’s brain can pick up on is the anger.  He can’t, however, pinpoint exactly where it stems from.  Swallowing, he licks his lips and waits for Dean to work on clarifying what situation that question is directed at.

Dean scoffs, rolls his eyes up, and shakes his head all at the same time.  “How long have you been hiding this?” he asks while making a gesture towards Sam’s middle, leaving no room for misunderstanding.

“Five months,” Sam answers honestly.  Now that everything is out in the open, he sees no reason to pretending it isn’t happening.

“Five months?”  Dean’s eyes go wide.  “ _Five months_?  You knew for _five months_ and you…you…you what?” His brow furrows his brows and his hands grasp for an invisible answer.  “You walk around doing nothing about it?  Letting _it_ just happen and _grow_ …”  He paces the room, back to Sam and mumbling something that doesn’t reach his brother’s ears.

Sam doesn’t like the way Dean said “it” and “grow.”  It almost makes him think his brother has written their kid off as a thing or a disease, rather than a human, just like Sam feared he would.  The baby doesn’t like it either because it’s a flurry of motion, doing _something_ inside Sam’s belly and intensifying the nervous shiver running through him.  Sam isn’t sure how to respond.  What Dean is saying is the truth.  Sam has done “nothing about it.”  For lack of a better explanation, Sam lets out a weak sigh and turns his head to follow Dean.  “Listen, I can explain?”

“Explain, what?  Explain how you walked around for over _five months_ knowing what was going on but deliberately decided to keep that information from me.  Did you…did you think….”  He groans and faces Sam, pacing back his way.  “You’re an asshole.  This has everything to do with me and you…you…”  A snarl doesn’t let him finish the sentence and he punches a fist into his hand.

Sam can tell there is more behind Dean’s words than just anger directed at his brother.  At the surface there is also evidence that Dean is angry at himself, that he feels stupid and frustrated and wants to shake Sam so badly that he gets whiplash.  “Dean, it’s not like that.”

“Oh, yeah?  It isn’t?”  Dean gives a look of mock surprise.  “Tell me then, Sammy, what’s it like?  ‘Cause I’d _love_ to know.”

Words bombard Sam’s brain and tongue.  He wants to throw up, knows he could if he gave the gesture a second thought, but instead he opens his mouth and lets streams of thoughts fall out.  “It’s…It’s survival, Dean.  It’s the only way I could figure out how to stay alive and keep it alive.  I _know_ it’s stupid.  I know _I’m_ an idiot.  I had no idea what to do.  I _still_ have no idea what to do.  I didn’t try to lie to you but I know not telling you the truth is practically the same thing.  I didn’t want this.  God, _I never wanted this_ , not now.  So I ignored it.  I hoped it would go away.  But it didn’t.  And then…I couldn’t think of a way to figure out how to keep it alive.  I realized I wanted to keep it alive.  I…I…Well…” Sam feels tears pricking at his eyes, making him squeeze his face up tightly in an attempt to keep them from falling.  “So I just thought I would keep pretending it wasn’t happening and pretending you wouldn’t want it gone.  And I thought maybe…I’d figure out how to get all of us out of this alive.  I thought – ”

Dean cuts him off, shock and hurt slamming into the place anger and frustration held seconds prior.  “You thought I’d want it gone?  You thought…”  Dean rubs at his jaw, stretching the muscles and running his fingers against two days’ worth of beard growth.  “God, you thought I would want you to get rid of it?  Even months after you wanted to keep it?”

Sam has no idea what’s happening.  Dean is staring at him with anger again, anger because Sam just expressed the concept of killing their unborn child.  Sam swore he was going to be the one giving those hurt looks but Dean looks like Sam just stabbed him in the gut.  “You don’t?  Want to get rid of it, I mean.”

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Dean runs a hand through his hair.  “Fuck, Sam…”  His mind goes somewhere else and his eyes cloud as a result.  “There was so much blood.  You were…”  His voice cracks for a fraction of a second and he licks his upper lip.  “You were covered in it.  I thought…maybe…you finally bit off more than you could chew.  Then you woke up and told me you were pregnant.  I thought you were delirious from blood loss and pain.  But you passed out again.  I felt it, you know?  I had my hand up against your belly and I swear I felt it.  It was so soft that I thought I imagined it but I didn’t, did I?”  Dean casts sad eyes on Sam and gestures to Sam’s middle with a nod of his head.  “It moves, doesn’t it?”

“All the time.”  Sam’s fingers strum over the proof of that fact.  His heart feels heavy and exhausted but every single part of him is trying to power through and figure this out.

A wounded laugh leaves Dean’s throat, almost like he can’t believe what Sam just said.  “You’re an asshole.”

It’s the fourth time Sam’s been called that and he suddenly feels like he deserves every single one of them.  Even if he didn’t, he’s too weak to protest and lets Dean’s words wash over him.

“You’re an idiot.”  Dean covers his hand with his palm and pulls it downward in a slow drag.  When he looks Sam in the eye, he looks exhausted rather than angry.  He looks bruised and shell-shocked.  “For _five months_ you put yourself in danger.  Damnit!  Do you know how many times you could have gotten hurt?”

“It’s what we do.  We always ‘could have gotten hurt,’” Sam says stupidly.

“Do you know how many times you put our kid at risk?” Dean clarifies.

Just like that, Sam realizes Dean cares.  He is able to pinpoint the source of Dean’s anger.  His brother isn’t angry that he’s pregnant, he’s angry that he’s been hiding it and putting himself and their baby’s safety on the line.

“Sam, I can’t believe you.  Hiding it from me is one thing, and we’ll talk about that later, but diving into an all-out brawl with a werewolf?  That’s insane.  That’s – ”

“You would have died!”

“This isn’t about me,” Dean says, quick to shut Sam down.

“But it is!  This is what you always do.  This is why I hid everything.  I get it that you take care of me.  I’m used to that.  But you can be responsible for everything I do, even the stupid shit.  And I thought…I thought you would pile the burdens of having a kid on yourself and I, well, I thought you’d think it was safer for us to get rid of the baby.  Hell, I thought that too.  But now I _can’t_.  I don’t want to.  And I’m sorry I didn’t tell you – ” Sam lets out a muffled noise of surprise as Dean crashes his dry lips against Sam’s.  The kiss isn’t gentle, but it denotes everything Sam had hoped for but was certain Dean wouldn’t give him.  It’s intense and desperate and Dean’s hands are grabbing at his jaw like he’s trying to find a way to keep Sam this close at all times.

“Shut up, Sam.  Shut up.”  Dean’s words come out more vulnerable than Sam ever remembers hearing them.  “I don’t want to get rid of the baby.  But I don’t want to lose you either because you’re being a pig headed, smart-ass little brother.”

Sam whimpers and hates himself for it.  “I know having a kid isn’t ideal – ”  Sam’s words are cut off by another rough kiss from Dean, lips working so hard that they leave Sam’s feeling flushed and swollen.  Alive.

“I said to shut up.”  There is no heat in Dean’s words.  His lips move more softly now.  “I’m pissed at you.  Hell, five minutes ago I was fucking furious.  But I’m not pissed because you’re pregnant.  You know that, right?  There’s _nothing_ I wouldn’t do for you or your – our – plus one.”

Pressing his lips together, Sam nods.  His head feels like there are bricks weighing it down and he groans.

“What?” Dean asks in concern.

“Everything just, _hurts_.”

“Like… _baby_ hurts?

Sam shakes his head.  “Like I got my ass handed to me by a werewolf hurts.”

Something in Dean gives way and the rigidness in his body goes out.  “We’re not done talking about this.”  Dean kicks off his shoes and swings his legs up onto the bed.  He rolls on his side, torso propped up with one of his elbows, like he’s guarding Sam.  “But, we can talk about it later.  After you’re in one piece again.”

“I’m kinda more than one piece on a good day, right now.”

Dean snorts.  “You know what I mean, Sammy.”

Sam does and now that Dean does too he feels like they found themselves in new territory.  As much as he hates when Dean calls him Sammy, the nickname on his brother’s tongue settles some bundle of nerves inside of him.  “Hey, Dean?”

“Hmm?”

“We’re having a baby.”  Despite the pain from his wounds and the butterflies in his belly, Sam smiles.  “I just wanted to let you know, in case…in case we weren’t clear about that.”

Dean snorts, shaking his head and rolling his eyes like he did when they started this conversation, only this time the gesture is soft.  “Yeah, Sammy.  I guess we are.”

“And that’s okay?”  Sam’s gut clenches with the fear that Dean’s about to make a drastic turn around.

“As long as you don’t have any other surprises for me, then it’s okay.”

Sam’s fingers splay over his middle.  “ _This_ is enough of a surprise for the both of us.”

They stare at each other through the words settling between them.  Dean clears his throat and utters a quiet, “thank you.”

“For?” Sam asks with a weakly raised eyebrow.

“For being a pig headed, smart-ass little brother who figured out how to kill a werewolf while keeping our kid alive and saving my hide.”

Sam snorts a laugh and takes a deep breath.  His lungs expand and remind him that he doesn’t have to worry about breathing anymore.  His heart is back in his chest and Dean’s busy making sure he doesn’t die from….anything.  He wants to sleep again but Dean won’t let him and Sam knows it’s because he’s worried about a concussion.  Instead, Dean keeps him up with meaningless banter and touches to Sam’s middle that leave an explosion of tingling in their wake.

There’s a kid struggling to etch out a life for itself growing under both of their palms and Sam’s fairly certain it’s still alive because it is resilient like its daddies.  He doesn’t say anything nearly that sappy out load and they both pretend they aren’t touching Sam’s middle so gently because of what it represents.  Somehow, they manage to talk about it without actually _talking about it_.

At their core, they are secrets and lies.  They’re misunderstandings and rushed into conclusions.  They aren’t touchy feely and their emotions aren’t easy to read.  They are, however, each other’s middle ground and every time they find their ways back to each other, they don’t need words to communicate.

They’re going to have a kid and Dean’s finger tracing the outlines of runes and symbols over Sam’s distended middle speaks volumes about how he feels on that matter.

The anger over Sam putting himself in danger will be there tomorrow.

They’ll yell at each other tomorrow.

Tomorrow.

Not tonight.  Tonight they’re done using words but they’re still talking.

**Author's Note:**

> Sequel called "Choices We Make" : http://archiveofourown.org/works/1122127  
> I hope you (and the OP) liked. Happy Holidays. Sorry for a very not holiday-ish story. That will be posted tomorrow.


End file.
